Download The Homewood Campus: Its Buildings, Monuments and Sculpture

PLEASE NOTE:
This guide to Homewood Campus buildings, monuments and sculpture was compiled
in 1990. In 2010, it was expanded to cover new construction in the intervening twenty
years. Statements made in this document relating to the “current” use or occupants of
buildings were correct as of 1990, but no attempt has been made to update the current
use or occupants of buildings. This document is intended to provide information on
how, when, and why buildings were constructed, as well as to provide information on
buildings that are no longer standing.
The Homewood Campus: Its Buildings, Monuments and
Sculpture
Early History of The Johns Hopkins University
When Johns Hopkins died on December 24, 1873, he left $7 million to be divided
equally to found a University and a Hospital, both bearing his name. To the University,
he also bequeathed his country estate, Clifton, in the expectation that the rolling
300-acre site would become the campus. Hopkins's will forbade the trustees to pay for
buildings out of the endowment, but the income from the principal was not enough to
attract quality faculty and students and create elm-shaded quadrangles as well. Thus,
the trustees decided to acquire a temporary site in downtown Baltimore, near the
Peabody Library, to house the University until enough capital was accumulated to
construct a campus at Clifton. Toward this end, the trustees purchased a lot between
North Howard Street and North Eutaw Street, improved by two residences that were
converted into a single structure, known as the Administration Building; behind this the
University erected another building, named Hopkins Hall. These two buildings
comprised The Johns Hopkins University when formal instruction began in October
1876.
Shortly after the opening of classes, a Chemical Laboratory, sometimes known as
Dalton Hall, was added west of Hopkins Hall. In 1883, the University acquired a tract of
land at the corner of Eutaw and Little Ross streets (directly behind the Chemical
Laboratory), on which was built the Biological Laboratory. This was followed, in 1885,
by the purchase of another plot of land on the northwest corner of Monument Street and
Linden Avenue, where a Physical [Physics] Laboratory was erected. Upon his death in
1889, John W. McCoy, a wealthy Baltimore merchant, left the University a bequest of
$500,000. The bequest was used, in 1892-1894, for the construction of a four-story
building, known as McCoy Hall, which contained a large assembly hall, examination
rooms, department libraries, and seminar rooms.
Other buildings erected by Hopkins on its downtown campus were a Power House and
Levering Hall. Levering Hall, built in 1889 after the noted Baltimore Prohibitionist and
moral reformer Eugene Levering provided $20,000, served as a YMCA and student
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activities building. Levering Hall was originally constructed on the site of McCoy Hall,
but when the funds were received for McCoy Hall, the trustees purchased a second,
adjacent lot, at the northeast corner of Eutaw and Little Ross streets. They then had
Levering Hall lifted on jacks and rotated ninety degrees, which made room for the much
larger McCoy Hall and generated a great deal of local amazement in the process.
With the exceptions of the Physical Laboratory and the Power House, both of which
were located north of Monument Street, all of the early buildings were bounded by
Monument Street on the north, Howard Street on the east, Eutaw Street on the west,
and Centre Street on the south. Bisecting the campus, east to west, was a one-block-long
alley known as Little Ross Street. Running north and south between Little Ross and
Monument streets was another alley, Little Garden Street.
Although Hopkins had built a gymnasium in 1883 on the corner of Little Ross and Little
Garden streets, the University's urban location allowed no room for outdoor athletic
activities. Consequently, practice and playing fields were laid out at Clifton. Until
Homewood was acquired, Hopkins athletic teams utilized the Clifton fields, riding out to
them via streetcars or horse-drawn wagons. Except for these athletic fields, the Clifton
grounds were never utilized by the University.
By the early 1890s, the University began to run out of space, and President Daniel Coit
Gilman and the trustees were forced to consider moving to a new location. Sections of
Clifton had been condemned for a reservoir and a railroad right-of-way. Then, in 1894,
after a collapse in the value of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad stock that comprised a
large portion of the University's endowment, the trustees were compelled to sell the rest
of the estate to the city of Baltimore in order to raise operating funds. In November
1894, Gilman asked William Keyser, former president of the Baltimore Copper
Company, for his assistance in securing another site. In 1898 Keyser's cousin, William
Wyman, approached him with an offer to donate to the University sixty acres, situated
west of Charles Street and south of the intersection with University Parkway (then
known as Merryman's Lane). The two men, together with a group of four friends,
worked in secrecy over the next three years to secure options on adjacent tracts, and in
early 1901 offered 179 acres to the University, on the condition that it add one million
dollars to its endowment. There was a delay as the University proved unable to raise the
money, but after renewing their options, the donors offered the land again. This time the
only condition was that not less than thirty acres of the property be given to the city for
use as a public park. The trustees accepted the offer on February 22, 1902, and the
University had a new campus, Homewood. The origins of the name `Homewood' are
obscure, but the property was known by that name at least as early as the Carroll
ownership. [See entry for Homewood House.]
In August 1902, trustee R. Brent Keyser offered to pay the costs of a general scheme
determining what style of architecture should be used and what arrangement of the
property can best be made looking into its gradual development . . . so that in years to
come the groups of buildings, campus, athletic grounds, dormitories, etc., will form a
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symmetrical whole. After seeking advice from other colleges and universities, the Board
of Trustees appointed a permanent architectural advisory committee, consisting of
Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., Walter Cook, and J.B. Noel Wyatt. As its first act, the
committee invited five architectural firms to enter a competition to create an overall
campus plan for the University to follow into the indefinite future.
The plan finally selected, in November 1904, was that of the firm of Parker and Thomas.
It called for a circular main drive running between 33rd and 34th streets, leading up to a
roughly square quadrangle. The main academic building, containing the library and
graduate seminar rooms, was to be on the north side of this quadrangle, facing south
toward a second, rectangular quadrangle, which was to be bordered by buildings
containing the University's scientific laboratories. The plan also called for the main axis
of the campus to run approximately thirty degrees east of north, rather than on a
north-south line as it currently does.
Due to a lack of space downtown, and the sale of the Clifton estate, Homewood Field
and two botanical laboratories (facing the Botanical Gardens) were constructed on the
Homewood campus between 1907 and 1912. Because the University did not have enough
money to move all operations to Homewood immediately, only these structures were
built according to the original Parker and Thomas plan.
In 1910 the General Education Board, a philanthropic organization founded by John D.
Rockefeller, offered to give the University $250,000 if it could raise another $750,000.
Hopkins began a major campaign, the Endowment and Extension Fund, which raised a
total of just over $1.2 million by 1912. Half a million dollars of this money was retained
for the endowment, while the rest was placed in a building fund for the Homewood
campus. At the same time, the state of Maryland agreed to pay for the construction of
two buildings for the newly created School of Engineering.
With these funds now available, the University began its preparation in earnest. Parker
and Thomas revised the campus plan, taking into account the comments of the faculty
on the proposed arrangement. The two most significant changes were the decision to
build on a line parallel with Charles Street, rather than at an angle, and to move the
academic building (Gilman Hall) from the north to the west side of the main
quadrangle, where it would face the University's entrance (and Charles Street).
Construction began on both the Mechanical and Engineering Building (Maryland Hall)
and Gilman Hall in 1913, and they were completed in 1914 and 1915, respectively.
The School of Engineering moved to the new campus in the fall of 1914, but the
administration and the School of Arts and Sciences remained at the Howard Street
campus until the summer of 1916, when it was decided to house most of the science
departments in extra space in Maryland, Gilman, and the soon-to-be-completed Latrobe
Hall, rather than wait for separate laboratories to be built. The only department that did
not move at this time was chemistry, which remained at the old campus until Remsen
Hall was completed in 1924.
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The following is a collection of brief histories of the buildings and other landmarks on
the Homewood campus, and biographical sketches of the people for whom they are
named. Also included are University-owned buildings in the immediate vicinity of the
campus and several structures which no longer stand. This account does not claim to be
exhaustive, nor does it go into great detail in most cases. For further information on
anything in this history, readers may consult A History of the University Founded by
Johns Hopkins, by John C. French, or contact the Ferdinand Hamburger Archives at
[email protected].
Information contained in this document is believed to be accurate. However, space is
often reassigned, so current occupants or functions of certain buildings may change in
the future. This document was updated January-March 2009, to reflect new
construction and the removal of several older buildings.
A Brief History of the Homewood Campus
When the University was located downtown, students found housing in the many
convenient boarding houses in the neighborhood. These were lacking at Homewood,
and the administration recognized the need for dormitories. The campus plan drawn up
in 1906 included ten dormitories, all facing a central quadrangle. When the move to
Homewood occurred in 1916, however, a lack of funds prevented the University from
constructing any student housing. In 1919, a group of alumni led by George Radcliffe
(AB 1897, PhD 1900) raised funds for a building to honor their classmates who had died
in the First World War. The cornerstone of the Alumni Memorial Dormitory was laid in
June 1922, and the building opened in the fall of 1923. When a second structure was
built in 1953-1954, the buildings became the Alumni Memorial Residences (AMR), and
the present names of the fourteen houses that make up the two dormitories were
chosen. The original dormitory building is now referred to as AMR I, while the newer
structure is known as AMR II.
AMR II: Adams. The first professor of history at Hopkins and founder of the Johns
Hopkins Seminary of History and Politics, Herbert Baxter Adams was a leading figure in
the creation of the modern historical profession. Primarily an administrator, Adams
organized the American Historical Association and served as the chief of the
Department of Liberal Arts at the World's Columbian Exhibition in 1893. He also
supervised the graduate work of such famous historians as Frederick Jackson Turner
and J. Franklin Jameson, as well as future President Woodrow Wilson.
AMR II: Baker. Newton Diehl Baker, a member of the Class of 1892 and a University
trustee from 1918 until his death in 1937, was a prominent Democratic politician. Mayor
of Cleveland from 1912 to 1916, he turned down the post of secretary of the interior in
Woodrow Wilson's original cabinet, but later served as secretary of war from 1916 to
1921. A self-described pacifist, he was responsible for the Selective Service Act, and the
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mobilization of what was, at that time, the largest army in U.S. history. Often mentioned
as a presidential contender, Baker never ran, preferring to devote himself to the cause of
internationalism and his law practice.
AMR II: Clark. William Bullock Clark was a professor of geology at Hopkins
(1887-1917) who led the department through a period of great growth, during which it
awarded forty-six PhDs, twice as many as any other university. One of these was the first
PhD in meteorology ever earned in the United States. In addition to this, Clark founded
and directed both the Maryland State Weather Service and the Maryland Geological
Survey, as well as serving as the state's representative when the Mason-Dixon line was
resurveyed in 1900.
AMR II: Gildersleeve. A classicist at the University of Virginia who had spent his
summer vacations as a Confederate staff officer, Basil Lanneau Gildersleeve was hired
by Daniel Gilman in 1876 to become the first professor of Greek at Johns Hopkins. The
greatest classical grammarian of the nineteenth century, Gildersleeve led the Greek
Seminary for nearly forty years and founded The American Journal of Philology.
AMR II: Griffin. Edward Herrick Griffin started his career in the ministry, becoming
the pastor of the second largest Congregational church in Vermont by the time he was
twenty-nine. He went on to teach Latin and philosophy at Williams College before
coming to Hopkins in 1889 to become the first dean of the college faculty. Known as the
gentle dean because of his kindness and understanding, Griffin won the respect and
admiration of an entire generation of Hopkins students.
AMR II: Hollander. After receiving his AB and PhD from Hopkins, Jacob Harry
Hollander went on to teach political economy from 1894 until his death in 1940. An
authority on government finance and taxation, Hollander redesigned the tax laws of the
territory of Puerto Rico at the request of President William McKinley, and later
performed the same service for the Dominican Republic. An arbitrator in numerous
labor disputes, and chairman of the Baltimore Labor Relations Board, he went on to
become active in Republican politics and an outspoken opponent of the New Deal.
AMR II: Jennings. Director of the Hopkins Zoological Laboratory from 1906 to 1938,
Herbert Spencer Jennings was one of America's foremost evolutionary biologists.
Although he spent most of his time studying the processes of evolution in paramecia,
Jennings became famous for his statements on the social applications of biology, and
was one of the leading proponents of the idea that environment is as important as
heredity.
AMR II: Lazear. After receiving his MD from Columbia, Jesse William Lazear (AB
1889) went on to teach at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. In 1900, while serving
as a member of the United States Yellow Fever Commission in Cuba, he contracted the
disease after allowing himself to be bitten by an infected mosquito. When he died
shortly thereafter, Lazear was widely hailed as a martyr to science.
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AMR I: Royce. One of the twenty original scholars of promise to receive fellowships in
the University, and one of the first four men to take a PhD from Hopkins (1878), Josiah
Royce went on to become a professor of philosophy at Harvard from 1882 until his
death in 1916. Considered the foremost American idealist, he was best known for his
spirited defense of the importance of the ideas of loyalty and community, but he also
made significant contributions to the study of symbolic logic and the foundations of
mathematics.
AMR I: Sylvester. The first professor of mathematics at Hopkins (1876-1883), James
Joseph Sylvester was one of the great mathematicians of the nineteenth century. After
completing his studies at Cambridge, he was denied both his degree and the opportunity
to compete for a fellowship because he was Jewish. Despite this setback, he became one
of the pioneers of modern algebra, and (with his friend Arthur Cayley) developed the
theory of invariants, which was greeted as a step in mathematical progress greater than
any made since the Differential Calculus. Additionally, Sylvester was widely known as
the Mathematical Adam, due to the number of new terms that he developed.
AMR I: Vincent. After receiving his PhD in history from Hopkins in 1890, John
Martin Vincent went on to teach at the University for the next thirty-five years. A gifted
lecturer loved by his students, Vincent was known for taking classes to his home and
feeding them dinner while he showed slides from his trips to Europe. After he retired in
1925, Vincent invested some profits from the sale of land in the fledgling Dow Chemical
Company (rumored to have been pointed out to him by colleagues in the chemistry
department). Soon he was returning his pension checks uncashed, and upon his death in
1939, he left over $1 million to the history department.
AMR I: Willard. After dropping out of the Massachusetts Agricultural College for
medical reasons, Daniel Willard worked his way up from track walker to president of the
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. Willard served on the University's Board of Trustees from
1915 until his death in 1942, and was president of that body from 1926 to 1941. One of
the nation's leading industrial statesmen, he served as chairman of the War Industries
Board during the First World War and was a regular visitor at the White House
throughout the 1920s and 1930s. He was also extraordinarily popular among the B&O
workers, who referred to him as Uncle Dan, and were instrumental in having the rail
center of Willard, Ohio named after him.
AMR I: Wilson. After receiving his PhD in history from Hopkins in 1886, Thomas
Woodrow Wilson taught at Bryn Mawr College and Princeton University. After
becoming president of Princeton, he was elected governor of New Jersey and, in 1912,
president of the United States. Wilson was the only U.S. president to earn a doctorate.
AMR I: Wood. A professor of experimental physics at Hopkins from 1901 to 1938, and
a research professor from 1938 to 1955, Robert Williams Wood was the foremost
researcher in physical optics of his day. In addition to continuing and expanding
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Rowland's work on diffraction gratings, Wood developed both infrared and ultraviolet
photography, and was apparently the first person ever to show animated films. He also
invented such widely disparate items as the frosted glass light bulb, the Vienna method
of detecting forged documents, and a new type of anti-aircraft shell. Wood's work had a
lighter side as well, best shown in his book of nonsense verse How to Tell the Birds from
the Flowers (which went through more than twenty printings), and in his formal
presentation of spectrographic data proving that the Moon is not made of green cheese.
AMR III. See Buildings A and B.
Ames Hall was designed by Fisher, Williams, Nes, and Campbell and built in
1953-1954, with funds provided by the state of Maryland. It was dedicated in honor of
Joseph S. Ames on May 15, 1955. Ames, who spent his entire academic career at
Hopkins (AB 1886, PhD 1890, faculty 1898-1935, dean 1924-1929, provost 1926-1929,
and president of the University from 1929 to 1935), was known primarily for his
pioneering work in organizing the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics, the
predecessor of NASA. Originally used by the Departments of Electrical Engineering,
Astrophysics, and Sanitary Engineering, Ames Hall was completely renovated between
1986 and 1988 and now houses the Departments of Psychology and of Geography and
Environmental Engineering.
Aspenview was a frame house which stood at the north end of campus, on the current
site of the Newton H. White, Jr. Athletic Center. It was the home of R.J. Handley, whose
eleven-acre estate was purchased by W.H. Buckler and Julian LeRoy White in 1902 and
given to the University as part of the original Homewood donation. The building was
outfitted as an athletic clubhouse in 1907, when Homewood Field was constructed, and
it served as the office of the graduate manager of athletics. In 1964 the building was torn
down to allow for the construction of the Athletic Center.
The Astronomy Building was a brick structure, twenty feet square, built in 1928 to
house a ten-inch telescope which had been located in the Physical Laboratory at the old
downtown campus. The building was torn down to make room for the construction of
Biology East.
The Baltimorean Apartments, located in the 2900 block of Charles Street, were built
in 1927 and purchased by the University in 1975. The building provided housing for
approximately sixty-four students in efficiency apartments until it was sold back into
private hands in the 1990s.
Barton Hall, designed by the firm of Meyer and Ayers, was built in 1961-1962 to
accommodate the Radiation Laboratory, a branch of the University that did research for
the U.S. Air Force. It was named for Carlyle Barton, chairman of the University's Board
of Trustees from 1941 to 1958 and a partner in the Baltimore law firm of Niles, Barton,
and Wilmer. When the Radiation Lab, by that time known as the Carlyle Barton
Laboratory, closed in 1970, the Department of Electrical Engineering took over the
building.
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The east wing of the biology complex, currently known as Biology East, was built
between 1981 and 1983.
The Blackstone Apartments were built in the 1920s as private apartments. This
building, along with the Charles Apartments, were purchased by Hopkins in 2006 and
extensively renovated to provide additional student housing.
The Bloomberg Center for Physics and Astronomy was designed by Fritz Read of
Ayers/Saint/Gross, the firm that designed the Eisenhower Library and Shriver Hall.
Built between 1987 and 1990, the Bloomberg Center is, at 238,000 square feet, the
largest building yet constructed on the Homewood Campus. The building, dedicated on
April 23, 1990, is named in honor of Michael Bloomberg (AB 1964, trustee
1987-present) and his wife Susan, whose generosity made the building possible.
Bowman Drive ran from Wyman Park Drive to San Martin Drive, where it exited
through the Lacrosse Gates. It was named after University President Isaiah Bowman in
1974. A prominent geographer who advised the U.S. government at both the Versailles
Peace Conference and the Dumbarton Oaks Conference of 1944, Bowman served as
president of Johns Hopkins from 1935 to 1948. In 1996-97, this road was re-routed as
part of the plan to divert vehicles from driving into the heart of campus. It now goes
past Mason Hall and exits back on Wyman Park Drive
The Bradford Apartments, located at 3301 St. Paul Street, were purchased by the
University in 1947 to help accommodate the large numbers of students, especially
married veterans, who came to Hopkins in the years immediately following the Second
World War. The Bradford was completely renovated in 1989-1990, and currently houses
151 students in 75 apartments.
Bronk Drive, which ran from Wyman Park Drive to an intersection with Bowman
Drive in front of Merryman Hall, was named after Detlev W. Bronk in 1978. Bronk
served as the University's sixth president, from 1949 to 1953, before going on to become
president of the Rockefeller Institute for Medicine, which became Rockefeller University
in 1965. In 1996-97, this road was modified as part of the plan to divert vehicles from
driving into the heart of campus. It now ends between Clark and Hodson halls.
The Bufano Sculpture Garden, located in Dunning Park, was dedicated on May 16,
1983. The garden consists of ten pieces of sculpture depicting various animals, all of
which were fashioned by the twentieth-century artist Beniamino Bufano, and donated to
the University by his son, Erskine Bufano, and other members of the Bufano Society of
the Arts.
In 1982-1983, a third set of dormitories was built. These dormitories have not been
formally dedicated and are currently known as Building A and Building B.
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The Bunting-Meyerhoff Interfaith & Community Service Center was set up
with the belief that understanding other religions and spiritual practices should be an
active pursuit instead of living in ignorance. The building, located at the corner of
Charles Street and University Parkway, once housed the A.W. Wilson Methodist Church,
but thanks to donations from George L. Bunting and Harvey M. Meyerhoff, the building
was renovated in 1998 and dedicated as an interfaith center on May 2, 1999.
The Carnegie Building, formerly located on the northwest corner of the campus, at
the intersection of San Martin Drive and University Parkway, housed the Department of
Embryology of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, an independent research center
with close ties to the Hopkins biology department. The building was designed by
William E. Haible, of the firm Anderson, Beckwith, and Haible of Boston, and was
constructed between 1960 and 1962. The Carnegie Corporation outgrew this facility and
erected a new structure across San Martin Drive in 2005.
The Centennial Sculpture, located at the edge of the Keyser Quadrangle behind the
Eisenhower Library, was created in 1976 by sculptor David Brown to mark the one
hundredth anniversary of the University's founding. It was donated to the University by
Robert H. Levi (BS 1936), vice-chairman of Mercantile-Safe Deposit and Trust Company
and a Hopkins trustee, and his wife, Ryda. Constructed of thirty-one bars of polished
steel, the sculpture was unveiled by former University President Milton S. Eisenhower at
the first of a series of official events marking the University's centennial. According to
Brown, "The design, which sort of goes out and comes back in, is like my idea of what a
student is."
The Charles Apartments were built in the 1920s as private apartments. This
building, along with the Blackstone Apartments, were purchased by Hopkins in 2006
and extensively renovated to provide additional student housing.
Charles Commons was completed in 2006 as a part of the Struever Bros initiative to
transform St. Paul and the Charles Village community into a vibrant college town, as
well as provide more housing for Hopkins’ undergraduate upperclassmen. The two
towers house a Starbucks and a Barnes & Noble (replacing the book store formerly in
the basement of Gilman), as well as the Johns Hopkins Federal Credit Union.
The Chemistry Building replaced Dunning Hall as the fulcrum for chemistry research
at Homewood in 2003. It was designed by the Ballenger Corporation of Philadelphia.
Along with laboratory and office space, the building houses the Nuclear Magnetic
Resonance Center, and complements Remsen Hall, the historic home of chemistry on
the Homewood Campus.
Clark Hall was the first Hopkins building to be devoted solely to research and
education in the 21st century. It was dedicated in 2001 and is the center for biomedical
engineering research at Homewood. The building was designed by Robert A.M. Stern
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Architects of New York and was named after James A. Clark, CEO of Clark Enterprises
and a University trustee emeritus.
Club Circle, the road that branches off of Bowman Drive to encircle the Johns Hopkins
Club, was named in November of 1974.
The Computational Science and Engineering Building was constructed by
Whiting-Turner Contracting Company in 2007. It is part of the Decker quadrangle and
was built to house interdisciplinary research for the schools of Engineering, Arts &
Sciences, and Medicine.
The Decker Gardens, bordered by the Greenhouse, Nichols House, and the Johns
Hopkins Club, were originally known as the Botanical Gardens and were used by
members of the biology department to grow plants for research. By the early 1950s the
gardens no longer served an educational purpose, and in 1958, when Nichols House was
built as the president's residence, they were completely re-landscaped with aesthetic
criteria in mind. In 1976 the gardens were done over again, and named for trustee
Alonzo G. Decker, Jr. and members of his family in appreciation for their generosity to
Hopkins. Decker, chairman of the Black & Decker company, chaired the Hopkins
Hundreds fundraising drive, which raised $109 million for the University and Hospital.
The statue in the middle of the pool, the Sea Urchin, was sculpted by Edward Berge. It
stood in Mt. Vernon Place, near the Washington Monument, for thirty-four years before
being replaced by a 7 10" copy, which fit in better with its monumental surroundings.
Frank R. Huber, the man who left the city the money to make the copy, asked that the
original be given to Paul M. Higinbotham, who donated it to the University.
Dunning Hall, located directly behind Remsen Hall, was built between 1964 and 1966
and named in honor of the Dunning family: Henry A.B. Dunning, president of Hynson,
Westcott, and Dunning, Inc., the pharmaceutical manufacturing company which
developed Mercurochrome, and his three sons, all of whom graduated from Hopkins
with PhDs in chemistry: J.H. Fitzgerald Dunning (trustee 1960-1981), Henry A.B.
Dunning, Jr., and Charles A. Dunning. Dunning Hall housed chemistry laboratories
until the new chemistry building was completed in 2003. Dunning Hall is now used for
office and classroom space.
J.H. Fitzgerald Dunning provided the funds to establish Dunning Park in a wooded
area on the north end of campus in 1966. When the new biology complex was
constructed on the site of the park in 1976, it was moved farther north, next to the
Newton H. White, Jr. Athletic Center. Dunning Park was rededicated on this new site in
1983, and is the home of the Bufano Sculpture Garden.
The Education Center is located at 3505 North Charles Street. It was purchased in
1967 to house the Center for Social Organization of Schools. As of 2009, this building
houses the Department of History of Science and Technology.
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Ground was broken for the Milton S. Eisenhower Library on June 13, 1962. The
culmination of a project that had begun in 1956, the new building was designed to
consolidate the library materials scattered in departmental libraries all over campus,
with room (it was hoped) for expansion into the next century. Because such a large
building was required to accommodate all the collections, the architects, Wrenn, Lewis,
and Jencks (working in association with Meyer and Ayers) located four and a half of the
library's six floors below ground level so as not to dwarf the older, smaller buildings on
campus. Beginning on August 17, 1964, the one million books which were then held in
the Gilman stacks and elsewhere were moved onto the new structure's thirty miles of
shelves (a process which took five months to complete), and the building was formally
dedicated on November 7, 1964. In April 1965, the University trustees unanimously
voted to name the library in honor of Milton Stover Eisenhower, president of the
University from 1956 to 1967 and again from April 1971 to February 1972. The
Eisenhower Library building also contains the Center for the Study of Recent American
History, which is editing and publishing the papers of U.S. President Dwight D.
Eisenhower.
Evergreen House, located at 4545 North Charles Street, was built in the 1850s by the
Broadbent family, in what was then Baltimore County. In 1878, T. Harrison Garrett, the
son of railroad magnate and original Hopkins trustee John Work Garrett, bought and
enlarged the house, which then passed to his son, also named John Work Garrett. A
career member of the diplomatic corps, J.W. Garrett served in embassies in Holland,
Germany, Venezuela, and Argentina and was appointed ambassador to Italy by
President Herbert Hoover in 1929. He also served as a Hopkins trustee from 1937 to
1940 and donated the house to the University in 1942, along with his extensive
collections of art, coins, rare books, and stamps. His wife, Alice W. Garrett, was also a
connoisseur and patron of a number of modern artists, including Picasso and Dufy,
whose works can be found at Evergreen. Her private theater was decorated by Leon
Bakst, designer for the Ballets Russes under Diaghilev. The building was completely
renovated between 1988 and 1990, and the University now uses Evergreen House for
special events and conferences.
Garland Hall, the University's central administration building, was designed by
Meyer, Ayers, and Saint, and constructed between 1969 and 1971. The construction was
originally planned to take much less time, but was delayed by workers' strikes in late
1969. The building is named in honor of Charles S. Garland, a trustee of the University
from 1946 to 1971 (chairman 1958-1968) and a partner in the Baltimore investment
banking firm of Alex. Brown and Sons. Garland was also a noted tennis player,
becoming the first American to win at Wimbledon when he and R. Norris Williams II
took the doubles championship in 1920.
The Gatehouse, also known as the Homewood Lodge, stood at the entrance to the
property of William Wyman, and was built around 1875 in the same Italianate style as
Homewood Villa. The Department of Gas Engineering used the building during the
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1920s and early 1930s. It then stood vacant for a time, until it was renovated in the late
1930s, and possibly occupied briefly by the Camera Club. The chemical engineering
department took over the building in 1939, using it for graduate student labs. During
this time, two students in the department also lived on the second floor. The
News-Letter moved its offices into the building in October 1965.
Gilman Hall was designed by Douglas Thomas (AB 1893) of Parker, Thomas, and Rice,
the firm that had won the 1904 competition for an overall campus design. The first
major academic building on campus, it was carefully based upon Homewood House,
beginning the tradition of Georgian academic buildings on campus. Construction began
in 1913, and the building was dedicated on May 21, 1915, and named for Daniel Coit
Gilman, the first president of The Johns Hopkins University. For many years, Gilman
Hall was the central academic building on campus. Combining classrooms, seminar
rooms, offices and libraries for all of the humanities and social sciences departments,
the building was a unique experiment in the combination of research and teaching.
Today, Gilman Hall still houses most of the humanities departments, as well as a bank,
the campus bookstore and post office, and overflow library stacks.
The main reading room, on the second floor of the building, was named in honor of
Albert D. Hutzler (AB 1909, trustee 1951-1961), in November 1965. Hutzler was one of
the founding members of the Friends of the Library and led the fundraising campaign
for the Milton S. Eisenhower Library. This room, now known as the Hutzler
Undergraduate Library, contains one of the building's most striking features, the
nineteen stained glass windows bearing the names and seals of fifteenth-century
European printers. These were given in 1930 by Mary King Carey, in memory of her
father, Francis T. King, one of the University's original trustees.
An extensive renovation of Gilman Hall began in 2008, and is scheduled to be
completed in 2010. While the exterior will not change, the interior will be completely
re-designed to better serve the humanities departments.
Give Peace A Chance is a sculpture donated by the Class of 1970. Located on the
Wyman Quadrangle opposite Shriver Hall, it was created by Theodore Scuris, a graduate
student in the Writing Seminars. The sculpture is made of welded aluminum and was
constructed, in the words of John Marron, president of the Class of 1970, to relate the
Georgian style of architecture to the Twentieth Century.
Goodnow Drive ran from the Robert G. Merrick Entrance on Charles Street to
University Parkway until 2001, when that drive was returned to its earlier configuration
as a loop running past Homewood House and back down to Charles Street. It was
named in November 1974 after Frank J. Goodnow, who served as president of the
University from 1914 to 1929. An authority on administrative and constitutional law,
Goodnow spent several years in China, serving as adviser to the newly created Chinese
republic.
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The Greenhouse was constructed in two stages. The Botanical Laboratory, the square
brick structure at the east end of the building and the adjoining section of greenhouse,
was built in 1908, the first building that the University erected on the new campus. It
contained facilities for plant observation and experimentation and bordered the
Botanical Gardens (see Decker Gardens), which contained weeds used for purposes of
study as well as decorative flowers. The Plant Physiology Laboratory, the brick building
in the center of the complex, and the greenhouses to the west of it, were added in
1911-1912. Both of these buildings were used primarily for botanical studies by the
biology department and the McCollum-Pratt Institute until the early 1970s, although
they also held offices of the Johns Hopkins Magazine. The building was then taken over
by the University administration for offices, although some of the greenhouses are still
used to grow plants used in landscaping the campus.
The Guy Memorial Walk runs from Goodnow Drive to Bowman Drive, behind
Remsen and Mergenthaler halls. The walk, which was dedicated on May 17, 1952, is
named after Robert F. Guy, who left the University $10,000 to beautify the campus. Guy
had no affiliation with Hopkins, but lived in an apartment overlooking the campus and
enjoyed the view. Several benches along the walk were donated by the Class of 1949.
Hodson Hall holds the most technologically advanced classrooms on the Homewood
campus. It was completed in the fall of 2002, replacing Merryman Hall, which was torn
down in 2001. Hodson Hall owes its high-tech designs to the Hille Architectural Firm,
from Princeton, New Jersey. Hodson Hall also houses the archives of the Hodson Trust.
The Homewood Apartments, located at 3003 North Charles Street, were acquired by
the University in December 1970. The seven-story building originally contained 160
apartments, providing housing for 196 graduate students and their families. It was
extensively renovated in the early 21st century and now contains more housing space and
retail shops.
Homewood Garage, located at 3330 St. Paul Street, was purchased by the University
in 1967. It contained about 250 parking spaces for students living in University housing.
To prepare the site for the Charles Commons construction, the garage was razed in
2003.
Homewood House was constructed between 1801 and 1803 (although improvements
and decoration continued into 1806) by Charles Carroll, Jr., the son of Charles Carroll of
Carrollton, a signer of the Declaration of Independence and one of the richest men in
America. In 1800 the elder Carroll, as a wedding present, presented his son with a
130-acre tract, referred to as Homewood Farm, and offered to pay for the construction
of a house. The architect is unknown, but it is believed that the house was designed by
Carroll himself, with the assistance of his builders, William and Robert Edwards.
Constant design changes and a desire to furnish the house in the most elegant manner
possible led the younger Carroll to spend the then-extravagant sum of $40,000, four
times what his father had expected. Carroll, Sr., paid the bills, although he often
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threatened not to, and for a few years the young couple lived happily, entertaining
brilliantly and raising a family.
The younger Carroll, who became known as Charles Carroll of Homewood, succumbed
to alcoholism and in 1816 his wife returned to her family in Philadelphia, taking their
five children with her. He lived in the house until his death in 1825, when Homewood
was inherited by his son, also named Charles. Charles Carroll III lived at Homewood
from 1825 to 1833, when he inherited the much larger estate of his grandfather,
Doughoregan Manor in Howard County. In 1839 he sold Homewood for $25,000 to
Samuel Wyman, a Boston native who had become a successful merchant in Baltimore.
Wyman lived in the house for about a dozen years, until 1853, when his son William
built the nearby Homewood Villa which became the family residence.
Homewood House stood vacant until 1897, when it was rented to the Country Day
School (later the Gilman School) for $1,000 a year. Although the house and its
surrounding land were given to the University in 1902, the school remained until 1910.
The building then went unused until 1916, when it was occupied by the Johns Hopkins
Club.
The Club remained until 1929, when the University received funds from Mr. and Mrs.
Francis P. Garvan to renovate the house and convert it into a museum to display their
collection of antique furniture. The restoration was finished in 1932, but the museum
did not last long. Faced with overcrowding in Remsen Hall, the University moved the
Offices of the President, Provost, and Secretary into the west wing of the building in
1936. During the Second World War, the need for space became so great that the
museum was closed, and the entire building was devoted to office space. In 1973 Robert
G. Merrick, a University trustee, donated funds to restore the building as a museum. As
a graduate student in the 1920s, Merrick had rented a room in the house from the Johns
Hopkins Club, and he retained a lifelong interest in the structure. During the
University's centennial celebration in 1976, Homewood House was dedicated as a
National Historic Landmark. In 1982, after alternate space had been found for the
offices that had been in the building, an extensive restoration project was begun under
the direction of the architectural firm of Mendel, Mesick, Cohen, Waite, and Hall with
the aim of recreating Homewood's early-nineteenth-century appearance. In September
1987, the Homewood Museum was opened to the public.
Homewood Villa was an Italianate structure built in 1853 by William Wyman, in
anticipation of his marriage to Helen Amanda Sanderson. Located near the southern
edge of the campus, the building served as Wyman's home until his death in 1903. He
gave the building, along with the rest of his estate, to Hopkins in 1902 (see Wyman
Quadrangle), under the condition that his daughter would be able to use the house and
several surrounding acres for the rest of her life. When the building passed to the
University in 1949, it had been allowed to deteriorate to the point where it could no
longer be used. In 1951 the Board of Trustees voted to have the building torn down. A
group of local citizens protested and formed the William Wyman Memorial Foundation
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to try and save the structure. The University agreed to give them time to raise money to
restore the house, but in May 1955, after several deadlines had passed, it went ahead
with the demolition.
The Johns Hopkins Monument, located at the intersection of Charles and 33rd
streets, was sculpted in 1935 by local artist Hans Schuler. The monument depicts two
human figures flanking a bust of Johns Hopkins. The male figure represents knowledge
and the University; the female figure represents healing and the Hospital. The
monument was originally located in the middle of the intersection of Charles and 34th
streets, but was moved to its present location in 1955 after it was determined to have
been the cause of several accidents.
The Hopkins Union is an addition to Levering Hall that was built between 1972 and
1974. It contains a small theater, several meeting rooms, and the Glass Pavilion, a large,
all-glass hall used for receptions, dinners, dances, and other social activities.
The Ivy Hall Apartments, located at 10-12 East 33rd Street, were purchased by the
University in 1988. The University began renovating the building in 1991 to
accommodate additional student housing and a University store. To make room for
Charles Commons, this building was razed in 2003.
Jenkins Hall was built in 1949-1950 to house the Department of Biophysics, a function
it continues to serve. The building is named in honor of Thomas C. Jenkins, a Hopkins
student in the late 1880s, whose widow, May McShane Jenkins, donated the funds
required for construction. In 1959, four more stories were added to the original
two-story structure, attached to the rear of Mergenthaler Hall. The funds for this
addition also came from the Jenkins endowment. The building was renovated in the
mid-1980s as part of a general series of renovations on the Homewood Campus.
When the University moved to the Homewood Campus, the Johns Hopkins Club
moved with it, occupying Homewood House until 1929, when that building was restored
as a museum. Club members had to content themselves with a small dining room in
Levering Hall until 1936, when Theodore Marburg (trustee 1902-1945) and his sister
Amelia, provided the necessary funds to construct the current building, in memory of
their brothers, William and Charles. The architects Wrenn, Lewis and Jencks designed a
modern counterpart to Homewood House, continuing the tradition of Georgian
buildings on campus. An addition, comprising an office and additional kitchen space
was made in 1956, and the kitchen facilities were again renovated and added to in
1980-1981. Additional dining space was added in 1986-1987.
The Keyser Quadrangle is bounded by the Eisenhower Library and Gilman Hall at its
ends and Ames, Rowland [Krieger], Mergenthaler, and Remsen halls around its sides. In
1954, it was named for William Keyser, a one-time president of the Baltimore Copper
Company, who was the moving force behind the donation of the Homewood property to
Hopkins. In 1901, he bought sixty-two acres of land, most of them from his cousin,
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Elizabeth Aldrich, William Wyman's sister, and donated them to the University in 1902.
At the same time he organized the donation of three additional tracts of land, totaling
seventy-one acres, by Samuel Keyser, Francis M. Jencks, William H. Buckler, and Julian
LeRoy White. These donations, combined with the donation of William Wyman formed
the original Homewood Campus.
Krieger Hall. See Rowland Hall.
The Lacrosse Gates, located where Bowman Drive enters San Martin Drive, were
given to the University in 1980 by trustee Robert G. Merrick. On Homecoming Day
1981, the entrance was dedicated to all lacrosse players and coaches whose efforts
contributed so materially to winning forty national championships from 1891 to 1980.
The Lacrosse Hall of Fame, located on the north end of the campus along University
Parkway, was designed by Grieves Associates and built in 1990-1991. The building is
leased by the University to the Lacrosse Foundation, a non profit organization that
promotes the sport of lacrosse. In addition to the Hall of Fame Museum, the building
contains the foundation's offices and a 113-seat auditorium.
The Sidney Lanier Memorial is located along Charles Street at the rear entrance to
the Alumni Memorial Residences. It was sculpted in 1941 by Hans Schuler, and donated
to Hopkins by the Municipal Art Society of Baltimore. Lanier, a lecturer in English at
Hopkins from 1879 until his death in 1881, was the most widely acclaimed Southern
poet of the post-Civil War period. He was also an accomplished musician, and, before
assuming his post at Hopkins, he was lead flutist of the Peabody Conservatory
Orchestra. The monument was unveiled on February 3, 1942, the centenary of Lanier's
birth.
Latrobe Hall, originally known as the Civil Engineering Building, was designed by
Joseph Evans Sperry. Ground was broken in October 1915, and the building was
occupied in the fall of 1916. It was renamed in 1931 to acknowledge the financial support
of the state of Maryland. Benjamin Henry Latrobe, Jr., was a Maryland native and chief
engineer of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad at the end of the nineteenth century. The
building was completely remodeled, with a 10,000 square foot addition, in 1984-1985,
and rededicated on September 9, 1985.
Levering Hall was designed by Edward L. Palmer (AB 1899) and built in 1928-1929.
The building is named in honor of Eugene Levering, a local banker and religious leader,
and a Hopkins trustee from 1898 to 1928. He was also a leader in the temperance
movement, becoming the Prohibition Party's first candidate for Congress from
Maryland, in 1886. Levering had provided $20,000 for a YMCA and student activities
building at the University's old downtown campus. After the University moved to the
Homewood Campus, the insurance money from the old Levering Hall, which had
burned, was supplemented by another donation from Levering and by funds raised by
students and alumni to build a new YMCA building on land provided by the University.
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In 1946 a one-story addition was made to the building to enlarge the cafeteria facilities.
A second story was added to this in 1963, to provide space for student groups.
In 1969 the University exercised its option in the original agreement with the YMCA and
purchased the building. Levering Hall now houses the offices of the Student Activities
Commission, the University Chaplain, and the Dean of Students as well as a cafeteria
and the Union Desk, where candy and newspapers are sold.
Work began on the Levi Building, the west wing of the biology complex, in August of
1980, and the building was ready for occupancy by the winter of 1983. The building was
dedicated to trustee Robert H. Levi and his wife Ryda H. Levi on April 15, 1985, for their
extraordinary devotion and generosity to The Johns Hopkins University.
Macaulay Hall was designed by the firm of Taylor and Fisher and constructed in
1963-1964 to provide facilities for the Department of Oceanography and the Chesapeake
Bay Institute. The construction costs were funded by joint grants from the National
Science Foundation, the Office of Naval Research, and the Atomic Energy Commission.
After the Chesapeake Bay Institute moved to new quarters closer to the Bay, in Shady
Side, Maryland, the Department of Anthropology and School of Continuing Studies
moved offices to Macaulay Hall. It is named in honor of P. Stewart Macaulay (AB 1923,
secretary of the University from 1936 to 1942, provost 1942-1959, and executive vice
president 1959-1966) who was instrumental in establishing both the Chesapeake Bay
Institute and the University's Applied Physics Laboratory in Howard County.
Machinery Hall. See Maryland Hall.
The University purchased the Greenway Apartments in 1963, during a housing shortage
caused by increased enrollment. In 1965 the building was renamed McCoy Hall in
honor of John W. McCoy. McCoy, a wealthy Baltimore merchant, first took an interest in
the University in 1884, when he was elected the first president of the Baltimore Society
of the Archaeological Institute of America, which also served as the Hopkins
Archaeological Seminary. Upon his death in 1889, McCoy left the University his
8,000-volume library, his house, and approximately half a million dollars, the largest
gift since Johns Hopkins's original bequest. The house served as the president's
residence until 1898, while the money was used to build the original McCoy Hall, which
held the humanities departments at the old downtown campus. That building burned
while it was standing vacant, shortly after the University moved to Homewood. The
University began extensive renovations on the present McCoy Hall in the summer of
1991, which are scheduled for completion in 1992.
Construction was begun on Maryland Hall in 1913, soon after Gilman Hall, and
although the building was occupied in the fall of 1914, it was dedicated at the same
ceremony as Gilman on May 21, 1915. It was first called the Mechanical and Electrical
Engineering building but in 1931 was renamed to recognize the critical role the
Maryland State Legislature played in establishing the School of Engineering in 1912. The
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one-story structure attached to the rear of the building was used for experiments with
heavy machinery and was known as Machinery Hall through the 1950s. Presently,
Maryland Hall is home to several engineering departments, as well as the University's
Instructional Television Project.
Mason Hall is the home of the Office of Undergraduate Admissions and is the
unofficial “front door” of the Homewood campus. It opened in the fall of 2007, along
with other buildings on the new Decker quadrangle. It was named after its chief donors,
Raymond A. Mason, trustee emeritus, and his wife Rand. Mason Hall was designed by
Shepley Bulfinch Richardson and Abbott out of Boston. The building serves as the
university’s Visitor Center and contains displays of artifacts and memorabilia relating to
Hopkins history.
The Mattin Center was sponsored by a donation from an anonymous alumna hoping
to encourage more Hopkins students to explore artistic and extracurricular options.
After some controversy over the design from award winning couple Tod Williams and
Billie Tsien, the Mattin Center, located on the corner of 33rd and Charles streets, opened
in the Spring of 2001.
Mergenthaler Hall, originally home to the biology department, was constructed in
1940-1941 with money provided by Eugene and Mrs. Ottmar Mergenthaler, son and
widow of Ottmar Mergenthaler, a German immigrant who invented the linotype
printing press in Baltimore in 1884. The north wing of the building, which parallels
Jenkins Hall, was added in 1961-1962. In 1984, after the biology department moved to
its new complex centered on Mudd Hall, the building was completely renovated, and has
been occupied by the Departments of Economics, History of Art, Political Science, and
Sociology, as well as several student services offices, including the Office of Academic
Advising. Currently, the Dean of Arts and Sciences resides in this building.
The Merrick Barn was built by Charles Carroll in the early nineteenth century.
Originally intended for dairy cattle, the structure was converted into a student center
when the University moved to Homewood. The ground floor contained three lunch
rooms and a barbershop, the second floor housed the offices of the YMCA and the
News-Letter (the University's student newspaper), and the loft was used by the
Dramatic Club, which renamed itself the Barnstormers. Today, the Barn is still used as a
theater by Theatre Hopkins, which moved into the building when its original theater,
the old Gilman School gym behind Homewood House, was torn down in the early 1940s.
In 1983, the Barn was formally named the Merrick Barn, in honor of Robert G. Merrick,
donor of the funds which made possible the restoration of both the Barn and
Homewood House.
The wall and gates of the Robert G. Merrick Entrance, located where Goodnow
Drive exits onto Charles Street, were designed by Robert Gaskin Lewis and built in 1964,
at roughly the same time as the Eisenhower Library. The funds for this structure were
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provided by trustee Robert G. Merrick in honor of the Class of 1917, and all Hopkins
men who served in the First World War.
The entrance off Howard Street at the southern end of campus, known as the Merrick
Wall, or sometimes the Serpentine Wall, was built in 1979 with funds provided by
Robert G. Merrick. The ironwork on the gates was added in 1981.
The east wing of Merryman Hall was constructed in 1948 as a temporary building for
the Department of Sanitary Engineering. However, when it was determined that
Whitehead Hall, then being built for the Department of Aeronautical Engineering,
would not be large enough, the two departments switched buildings, and the rest of
Merryman was added. Originally known as the Aeronautics Building, it was fully
equipped with supersonic and subsonic wind tunnels. In 1975, when the aeronautics
department moved into Ames Hall, the building was named for Joseph Merryman, who,
in 1688, became the first known owner of the Homewood property. This building was
torn down in Summer 2001 to make room for Hodson Hall.
Ground was broken for Mudd Hall on October 11, 1976, and the building was
completed in April of 1979. Mudd Hall is the central component of the University's three
part biology complex (the other buildings are Levi Hall and Biology East). It is named
for Seeley G. Mudd, a former dean of the School of Medicine at the University of
Southern California and the founder of a trust to be used for the construction of
buildings by private universities. Mudd Hall contains the offices of the biology
department, seminar rooms, labs, and a 350-seat lecture hall.
Ground was broken for the Steven Muller Building on August 18, 1981, and it was
dedicated on June 15, 1983. Designed by Verkerke, Boyles, and Linehan, the building
contains the Space Telescope Science Institute, which was set up by NASA and the
Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy to analyze data from the Hubble
Space Telescope. One of the more interesting things about the building is the fact that
the heat generated by the institute's many computers is used to heat the building in the
winter. Two wings were added to the building in 1987-1988, nearly doubling its size. On
June 18, 1990 the building was named after Steven Muller, the University's tenth
president, who was instrumental in bringing the institute to Hopkins.
The New Engineering Building, attached to the back of Shaffer Hall, was designed
by the firm of Verkerke, Boyles, Linehan and Doyle, and built in 1987-1988. It currently
houses the Dean of Engineering, the Department of Computer Science, and portions of
the Departments of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering. The Government
Publications Department of the Milton S. Eisenhower Library was located in the
basement of the building until 1997.
Nichols House, a two-story Georgian structure originally known as the President's
House, was designed by the architectural firm of William McMillan, Smith and Veale,
and built in 1958-1959. Its construction was funded with the proceeds from the sale of
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an off-campus building formerly used as the president's house, as well as a large gift
from Thomas Nichols, president of the Olin Mathieson Chemical Company, and a
member of the University's Board of Trustees. Intended to be the official residence of
the president of the University, the house was used as such by both Milton S.
Eisenhower and Lincoln Gordon. In 1972, when the new president, Steven Muller,
declined to live in the house, it was renamed Nichols House. It is now used for
receptions and as a guest house.
The Ralph S. O’Connor Recreation Center opened its doors in January 2002
thanks to a donation from Hopkins alumnus Ralph S. O’Connor. O’Connor donated $3
million to the University, $2.775 million of which was earmarked for the new
recreational center. O’Connor, a former Hopkins athlete, thought it unfair that the only
athletic facilities were reserved for the sports teams and sought to remedy that situation.
Olin Hall, which houses the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, was designed
by Mark Beck Associates and built in 1980-1981. It is named in honor of John M. Olin,
chairman of the Olin Mathieson Chemical Company, whose foundation provided the
funds for the building. Olin, who invented the plastic shotgun shell now in common use,
was a trustee of the University from 1953 to 1974.
The Power House was built in 1914 as a source both of power for the campus and
practical experience for electrical engineering students. The building was expanded in
1948, and still provides much of the University's steam and heat, as well as a small
portion of its electricity.
Remsen Hall was built in 1923-1924 to house the chemistry department, although it
also held most of the University's administration. In 1936, the Offices of the President,
Provost, and Secretary moved into Homewood House, but the Registrar remained in the
building until after the Second World War. In addition to the departmental offices,
Remsen Hall contains classrooms, laboratories, and a 350-seat lecture hall. The building
was named in honor of Ira Remsen in 1927. The first professor of chemistry at Hopkins
and president of the University from 1901 to 1913, Remsen is probably best known for
his participation in the discovery of saccharin in 1878. His ashes are interred behind a
plaque in the building.
The ROTC Building, formerly a Red Cross building at Ft. Patrick Henry in Virginia,
was given to the University in 1947 by the War Assets Administration. Hopkins had only
to prepare the site and construct the basement. This gave the Reserve Officers' Training
Corps convenient and adequate accommodations behind the gymnasium and near
athletic fields, where military drill and other outdoor exercises could be held. In
addition to housing the military science department, the building is used by the Hopkins
Band, the Outdoors Club, and the Radio Club.
Rogers House, located at 3506 Greenway, was left to the University in 1945 by Julia R.
Rogers. The Department of Geography moved into the house later that year, and
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remained until 1955. The building then housed various research groups until 1962, when
it was occupied by the Ballistic Analysis Laboratory, a Hopkins affiliate that did research
for the Army. The lab remained until December 1968, when its Hopkins connection was
severed. From 1969 to 1971, the building housed the offices of the Johns Hopkins Fund,
until that office moved into the recently completed Garland Hall. In 1972-1973 Rogers
House was converted into an apartment building to help provide additional housing for
female students.
Rowland Hall was built in 1929 for the physics department, allowing it to move out of
its cramped quarters in the attic of Maryland Hall. Designed by Wyatt and Nolting, the
building was completed in just nine months. It was named after Henry A. Rowland, the
first professor of physics at Johns Hopkins. Rowland did important work in
electrodynamics, and was awarded the Venetian prize for his efforts in establishing the
mechanical equivalent of heat. His greatest contributions, however, were made in the
field of spectroscopy. He perfected an engine for ruling diffraction gratings, and was
soon supplying them to scientists all over the world. Using one of his gratings, he made
a map of the solar spectrum which remained the world standard for thirty years. When
it was revised by the Mt. Wilson Observatory in 1928 (using a Rowland grating) the
largest correction amounted to one part in 30,000. Rowland's experimental career was
cut short when, shortly after he married at age forty-two, he discovered he had diabetes,
which was then untreatable. In an attempt to provide for his family, he spent the rest of
his life concentrating on applied science, developing a multi-channel telegraph and
working as a consultant to power companies.
An addition connecting the building to Maryland Hall was constructed in 1964. In 1990,
Rowland Hall was renamed for Zanvyl Krieger (AB 1928), who provided a large
donation to renovate the building for the Krieger Mind/Brain Institute, after the physics
department moved to the Bloomberg Center. Besides the Mind/Brain Institute, Krieger
Hall also houses the Departments of Mathematics and Cognitive Science and
Homewood Academic Computing.
The San Martin Center was built to be the new home for the Carnegie Institution of
Washington’s Department of Embryology, whose scientists hold joint appointments in
Johns Hopkins’ Biology Department. The center was completed in 2005 and was
designed by Zimmer, Gunsel, Fransca Partnership of Washington, with Margaret DeBolt
as the lead architect.
Shaffer Hall was designed by Smith and Veale and built in 1965. Built to ease a critical
classroom shortage, and originally known as the Classroom Building, Shaffer Hall is
composed almost entirely of classrooms. It also houses the offices of the dean and
directors of the School of Continuing Studies, and there is a large auditorium in the
basement, which is used for lectures and film presentations. In 1968, the building was
named in honor of G. Wilson Shaffer (AB 1924, PhD 1928), professor of physical
education from 1939 to 1941, founder (in 1937) and first director of the Homewood
Psychiatric Clinic, and dean of the Homewood Schools from 1948 to 1967.
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Shriver Hall, designed by the firm of Buckler, Fenhagen, Meyer and Ayers, was begun
in September 1952 and completed in 1954. In 1939 Alfred Jenkins Shriver, a local lawyer
who specialized in estates and testaments, left the University the residue of his estate to
build a lecture hall. According to the conditions of the will, the building's walls were
adorned with murals depicting the Hopkins class of 1891 (Shriver's class), ten
philanthropists of Baltimore, ten famous beauties of Baltimore (as chosen by Shriver),
the original Hopkins faculties of philosophy and medicine, the original Boards of
Trustees of the University and Hospital, and Baltimore clipper ships. In addition,
statues of President Daniel Coit Gilman and William H. Welch, first dean of the School
of Medicine, flank the entrance to the building. There is also a bust of Isaiah Bowman in
a niche under the porch. Had the University declined the bequest, it would have been
offered to Loyola College, and then to Goucher College, under similar conditions.
The Smokler Center for Jewish Life, at 3109 North Charles Street, was a project
spearheaded by Hopkins alumni Irving and Carol Smokler and became the first
permanent home for Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus Life. Completed in
2003 with support from Hillel and Harry and Jeanette Weinberg, the Center for Jewish
Life, designed by Cass Gottlieb of Kann & Associates, Inc., aims to foster a greater sense
of unity and exploration among the Jewish and the greater Hopkins communities.
The Spring House, which used to stand on the site of the current Hopkins Union, was
built in 1853, at the same time as Homewood Villa. When the University acquired the
Homewood Campus in 1902, the building was used by the biology department for,
among other things, experiments with crawfish. The structure was abandoned in 1938
and stood vacant until 1946, when it was torn down.
Steinwald House is located across the street from the Homewood Campus, at 3211 N.
Charles Street. It was acquired by the University in 1968, when a generous alumnus
provided funds to purchase and renovate the building as a new home for the Alumni
Office. In 1970 the building was named in honor of the retiring director of Alumni
Relations, Osmar Steinwald (BS 1928), who had founded the office in 1947. Steinwald
also directed the Glee Club from 1928 to 1958.
Athletic facilities were constructed at Homewood even before the University moved here
in 1916. In 1907, an athletic field was ready for use and Aspenview was equipped as a
clubhouse; grandstands were added in 1908 and 1910. The first gymnasium was
constructed in 1934.
Between 1963 and 1965, the facilities were expanded and renamed the Newton H.
White, Jr. Athletic Center, in honor of Captain Newton H. White, Jr., whose widow
made a large donation to the University for that purpose. White, a naval officer who
commanded the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise before the Second World War, became
interested in the University after reading a chemistry textbook by Ira Remsen. Having
been educated in a one-room school-house in Tennessee, White instituted the Newton
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H. White scholarships in 1954, to provide an opportunity for needy students to attend
Hopkins. The two figures outside the building were sculpted by Professor Joseph Brown
of Princeton, a former boxer who also created the statues outside the Spectrum and
Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia.
In 1967 the concrete grandstand on the south side of Homewood Field was named after
Conrad Gebelein, director of the Johns Hopkins Band from 1931 to 1974.
The White House was an old farmhouse that was part of the property donated to the
University in 1902. In 1908, the trustees had it moved from the area where Remsen Hall
now stands to its present site, on the north side of the Botanical Gardens, as a residence
for the gardener. In 1931, when the psychology department moved to the Homewood
Campus from its old quarters on what are now the grounds of Homewood Hospital
North, the department's Child Institute (a combined kindergarten and child psychology
research center) took over the building. Shortly after the institute closed in 1937, the
building was occupied by the Department of Physical Education and the Student Health
Service. It was occupied by the Office of Counseling and Psychiatric Services until it was
demolished in 2003 to make room for the new Chemistry Building.
Whitehead Hall was built in 1947-1948, in response to an urgent need for additional
facilities for the School of Engineering. It was named for John B. Whitehead, becoming
the first building at Hopkins to be named after a living person. Whitehead received a
certificate of proficiency in applied electricity in 1893, an AB in 1898, a PhD in physics
in 1902, and went on to teach electrical engineering until 1942. He was instrumental in
establishing the School of Engineering in 1912 and obtaining funding from the Maryland
State Legislature. He was dean of the Engineering School from its beginning to 1938 and
director of the School from 1938 until 1942. Whitehead Hall originally housed the
Department of Sanitary Engineering, the Offices of the Treasurer and the Plant
Manager, and the University's telephone exchange. An addition, comprising the third
floor of the main structure, and the one-story wing connecting it to the Power House,
was made in 1963. It now contains the offices of News and Information, the Gazette,
Design & Publications, the Johns Hopkins Magazine, the Division of Education of the
School of Continuing Studies, and other offices.
The University purchased the Cambridge Arms Apartments in April 1966. Built in 1920,
the apartments served as the home of F. Scott Fitzgerald for several years in the
mid-1930s. In May 1966 the building was named Wolman Hall, in honor of Professor
Abel Wolman (AB 1913, BSE 1915, Professor of Sanitary Engineering 1921-1989) who
developed the formula used in chlorinating water supplies. Wolman served as an adviser
on water matters to the governments of some fifty countries, and designed the water
systems of many American cities, including Baltimore and New York. The University
renovated Wolman Hall in 1990-1991, increasing the building's capacity from 220
students to nearly 500.
Wyman House, located at 2948 Wyman Parkway, is a converted rowhouse which
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houses five graduate students. It was acquired by the University in June of 1969 to
provide space for the Center for Urban Affairs, and converted to student housing in the
early 1970s.
Wyman Quadrangle was named in 1954 for William Wyman, the donor of a large
portion of the land on which the University now sits. Located at the southern end of
campus, the quadrangle is bounded by Shriver, Shaffer, Maryland, Rowland [Krieger],
Ames, Latrobe, and Barton halls. In 1898, Wyman approached his cousin William
Keyser (see Keyser Quadrangle) about the possibility of donating his estate to the
University. In 1902, after the donation of several adjacent parcels of land had been
arranged, and Hopkins agreed to add a million dollars to the endowment, he gave the
University sixty acres. Another condition of his gift was that the University give ten acres
to the city for use as a park; this land, at the extreme southern end of the property,
became Wyman Park Dell. The University also gave another forty-two acres on the
western edge of campus to create Wyman Park.
Wyman Villa. See Homewood Villa.
Homewood Campus Chronology
ca. 1803
Homewood House
Merrick Barn
1853
Homewood Villa
Spring House
ca. 1875
Gatehouse
pre-1902
White House
1907
Homewood Field
1908
Botanical Laboratory
1912
Plant Physiology Laboratory
1914
Maryland Hall
Power House
1915
Gilman Hall
1916
Latrobe Hall
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1923
Alumni Memorial Dormitory
1924
Remsen Hall
1929
Levering Hall
Rowland Hall
1934
1937
Gymnasium
Johns Hopkins Club
1941
Mergenthaler Hall
1946
Levering Hall *
1947
Whitehead Hall
ROTC Building
1948
Power House *
Merryman Hall
1950
Jenkins Hall
1954
Shriver Hall
Alumni Memorial Residence (AMR II)
1955
Ames Hall
1956
Johns Hopkins Club *
1959
Jenkins Hall *
Nichols House
1962
Barton Hall
Mergenthaler Hall *
1963
Whitehead Hall *
Levering Hall *
1964
Rowland Hall *
Milton S. Eisenhower Library
Macaulay Hall
1965
Newton H. White, Jr. Athletic Center
Shaffer Hall
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1966
Dunning Hall
1971
Garland Hall
1974
Mudd Hall
1981
Olin Hall
Johns Hopkins Club *
Levi Building
1982
1983
Muller Building
Buildings A and B
Biology East
1987
Johns Hopkins Club *
1988
New Engineering Building
1990
Bloomberg Center
1999
Bunting-Meyerhoff Interfaith Center
2001
Mattin Center
Clark Hall
2002
Ralph S. O’Connor Recreation Center
Hodson Hall
2003
Chemistry Building
Smokler Center for Jewish Life
2005
San Martin Center
2006
Charles Commons
2007
Mason Hall
Computational Science and Engineering Building [named
Hackerman Hall in 2010]
* Addition to existing building
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